Considering that I have something of an admiration for the games of old, particularly those in the DOS era where I wasn't old enough to really experience gaming as a whole until around the fifth generation of gaming, I was naturally attracted to such a title as Lost Patrol here, whereby it's premise is fairly unique in a war setting that isn't akin to your typical Call of Duty style of gameplay, which only added to my intrigue of finally getting to explore this old game now that it was offered on Steam here.
An absolute shame then that the port of this game, being based on the original AMIGA version from way back in 1991, is a rather poor translation of what should be a good return to form that is at least serviceable on more modern platforms.
Getting down into the nitty and gritty here though, Lost Patrol focuses on a team of seven American soldiers, one who is a Sergeant going by the name of Weaver and six other members who are all Private class, as the goal is to ensure the safety of each member of the team as you make your way across the hazardous and dangerous terrain of 1960's Vietnam which, in this time period, takes place during the Vietnam War when the Viet Cong was actively fighting both the South Vietnam and United States around that point in time.
To achieve victory here, one has to slowly make their way from the western end of the map all the way over to the east to reach the safety of the city Duhok in neighboring Iraq, carefully managing the limited resources of food to keep the team in good health and spirits whilst keeping an eye on both ammunition and grenades, the likes of which can only be resupplied in villages that are sparse and in great distances from one another. (And, even then, may not hold anything of value or even the right resources that you may be in dire need of!)
No doubt it is why it is crucial to looking after your fellow soldiers here, as each of them will help to reaching to Duhok that much of a better chance if they are alive and well, ensuring that the right person is taking the lead as well as a scout to keep an eye out for nearby VC that can be avoided with prior knowledge, although injuries sustained from previous battles will impact individual soldiers that, without enough food and rest, may lead to them being a burden on the team and eventually die to their injuries. (Restricting rations and pushing them too hard may also reduce their morale to an all-time low and possibly have them force Weaver out of a leading position or, worse yet, have him prematurely killed through means of 'fragging' as it were)
Since this actively takes place during the Vietnam War, combat encounters are frequent and are to be expected, since you will inevitably run into the Viet Cong one way or another, be it as a smaller-scale machine-gun ambush or a sniper shoot-out or on a much larger scale patrol conflict or, assuming you decide to use a scout to keep an eye on nearby VC activity, have a one-on-one battle with a Viet Cong scout in unarmed combat, the results of each battle determining whether you go by without issue or suffer casualties as a result of incompetence on the battlefield.
I should note that, for personal record, seeing as this port has issues relating to no sounds or music being played whatsoever alongside a more serious issue pertaining to a lack of mouse support that doesn't sound too bad until you realize the interface used in Lost Patrol largely relies on one being able to use a mouse since navigating the menu with just the keyboard and other situations is less than ideal but, for those who are curious, I will lay down the buttons below used and what they are used for:
O P Q A = Left, Right, Up, Down (Absolutely stupid way of designating buttons for directional movement, I know)
Enter/Space Bar = Select/Shoot
Esc = Exit
Numerical Pad (Far-right side of keyboard) = Directional movements on map
It should be noted that there is no way of rebinding these keys to something more logical, making the lack of mouse support that much more frustrating to deal with, especially in today's modern gaming era of 2023 where these are all very much common place things that PC gamers expect although, back 30 years ago, this was sadly not so much the case.
Obviously it is a pity that this port does not do the original game justice, as I would have very much liked to have experienced this game properly, plus it doesn't help that two of the three graphics modes, EGA and Tandy (16 Colour), do not function properly as the former has some UI display problems that make navigating the map tricky whilst the latter is, for lack of better words, completely broken and essentially makes the game unplayable at that!
A damn shame then that I couldn't refund this as, although I'm very fair when it comes to games that I've spent money and time on here, this is one title that I wish I could've refunded but, having bought this game months before eventually giving it a shot, it appears that I am down almost £5 that could've went towards a better indie title on Steam here.
Avoid Lost Patrol on Steam at all costs and only play if you REALLY are willing to accept the serious flaws that come with this poor excuse of a port!
TLDR Version:
• A title brought back from the early 90's that would be inaccessible to the vast majority of gamers today otherwise (+)
• Unique gameplay in a war setting that distinguishes itself from typical Call of Duty games by focusing on escaping from a hostile Vietnam ridden with Viet Cong during the 1960's with limited supplies as opposed to fighting them head-on (+)
• The VGA graphics does a serviceable job in showcasing the uneasy and warlike environment that you find yourself in whilst struggling to reach the safety of Duhok (+)
• No mouse support or key rebindings making playing through this game a chore at best and an absolute mind-numbing exercise at worst for modern gamers (-)
• Two of the three graphics options provided by Lost Patrol do not work as intended, with EGA suffering some UI display issues whilst Tandy (16 Colour) is completely broken and is unusable (-)
• Gameplay is likely to not appeal to those looking for an experience similar to that of Call of Duty or for FPS fans in general (-)
• The RNG nature of how often you encounter dangerous combat encounters may irk those who are looking for something skill-based with more direct control over one's chances at victory (-)
• No guide provided by the game, which makes figuring out the controls less than desirable without the aforementioned mouse support to alleviate this problem somewhat (-)
